50 Spiritual Classics Timeless wisdom from 50 great books of inner discovery, enlightenment, and purpose

Love

• “What is the best time to do each thing? Who are the most important people to work with?What is the most important thing to do at all times?”the most important time is now;the most important person is the one you are with;the most important act is making the person next to you happy.- The Miracle of Mindfulness, Thich Nhat Hanh
• “There are no ordinary moments!” - Way of the Peaceful Warrior
• A warrior is “happy without reason.” “The warrior acts… and the fool only reacts.”
• What you do to another person, at another level you are really doing to yourself.
• Love and forgiveness is the highest lesson to be learned.
• Love is more important than power.
• If we “stay present to the pain of disapproval or betrayal”—or any other painful feeling—Chödrön suggests it has a way of softening us. If we suppress it we only become a brittle person.
• Chödrön is aware how difficult it is to wish goodwill on someone you may normally feel like hating, and that is the idea: to work the muscles of the heart so that it becomes larger. If you fail in sending goodwill to someone you don’t feel it for, then you can stop. The idea is not to force yourself to be a saint, but to stretch what you are capable of in terms of compassion and loving kindness.
• Another practice to unharden the heart is to rejoice in others’ good fortune.
• Chödrön likes to practice aspiration in shops and supermarkets, where the opportunity for getting annoyed is high. Using aspiration, you can handle anyone because now you see them as basically another aspect of yourself.
• “There are many in the world dying for a piece of bread but there are many more dying for a little love.”
• In addition to physical help, give spiritual solace to those in need.

Mind

• Bhagavad-Gita says: “All actions take place in time by the interweaving of the forces of nature, but the man lost in selfish delusion thinks that he himself is the actor.”
• Krishnamurti suggests that the desire to become something always ends in disappointment or emptiness. It is not an intelligent way to live because it means you are always unhappy with the present, captured by envy and endless unsatisfied desires
• Nothing lasts forever anyway, so the world is much better served by people who work without the ugliness of desire for gain.
• Fear, pain, doubt, anger, and anxiety all derive from a separate sense of self.
• “When the mind is disturbed, the multiplicity of things is produced, but when the mind is quieted, the multiplicity of things disappears.”
• Most people feel comfortable with religion because it keeps them within the walls of their own thinking and habits, never tasting the freedom that exists beyond.
• If a person’s religion succeeds in making them more whole and providing inspiration, then it works.
• Become a real revolutionary by learning how to think beyond the confines of culture.
• Whether in failure or success, we must never take our eyes away from the fact that it is an amazing world, and we must rise to its challenges.
• You can say “I’m OK” on both good days and bad days, you will have made progress; you can have little to fear. 
• The moment you completely accept your non-peace, your non-peace becomes transmuted into peace.
• An awareness of eternity necessarily changes how we see day-to-day living.
• If you and I would cleanse the mind every day, free it of yesterday’s reminiscences, each one of us would then have a fresh mind, a mind capable of dealing with the many problems of existence.”
• We can enrich our life by tapping into the vast intelligence of the universe that exists beyond our brain. Paradoxically, by stopping the incessant chatter of the mind, we also gain self-knowledge. Thus not thinking, if it is done with purpose, can be the highest form of intelligence.
• “For most of your life you’ve lived as the effect of your experiences. Now, you’re invited to be the cause of them.”
• Socrates he discovers that the only way to have peace of mind and really to love life is to have a philosophy of “unreasonable happiness.”

Life

• Respect the world by taking responsibility for your own life.
• Extreme gratitude enables you to see the world afresh.
• Appreciate the world as it is, not how you would like it to be.
• Education is about how to love, how to live simply, how to free our mind from prejudice, superstition, and fear. Without this knowledge we will walk through life in an almost mechanical way, instead of becoming the truly creative person we could be. “If the mind does not penetrate beyond its own barriers,” Krishnamurti states, “there is misery.”
• The object of living is to find truth, and if we are not actively engaged in trying to get closer to the heart of things, then we are quickly dying.
• Doing what you love has a double benefit: not only will you find an uncommon level of contentment in daily life, but your enthusiasm for the work will take care of “success.
• “You can be creative only when there is abandonment—which means, really, when there is no sense of compulsion, no fear of not being, of not gaining, of not arriving.” 
• Go beyond color and creed to see the basic unity of humankind.
• Attain real peace by moving beyond the ego’s fears and wants and living a life of the spirit.
• A purely rational approach to life leads to madness. Peace requires us to look for the unseen quality or truth behind appearances.
• Lose your self-importance and adopt a strategy of unreasonable happiness.

Quantum Physics

• Einstein’s theory of relativity, however, showed that matter does not possess the solidity that our senses accord it. Things are not “things” but energy, which takes on the appearance and feel of form. The nature of the world is not solidity but perpetual motion.
• The “empty space” has an almost alive quality and particles can spontaneously appear out of it for no apparent reason.“Matter has appeared in these experiments as completely mutable. All particles can be transmuted into other particles; they can be created from energy and can vanish into energy.”
• In quantum physics, the creation or destruction of particles often happens for no reason. There is a field out of which they arise, and into which they go back, but they seem to act as if they are beyond cause and effect. Hinduism, for instance, has a word for this void, Brahman, a field of potentiality from which all things emerge, and the Dance of Shiva expresses the endless process of creation and destruction of matter. In Buddhism, the Sunyata is a living void that gives birth to everything physical. Taoism has as its central feature the Tao, the empty, formless nature of the universe, which nevertheless is the basic substance of creation.
• “Life does continually go up and down. People and situations are unpredictable and so is everything else.”

Death

• “People associate death as losing our life force, when actually the opposite is true. We forfeit our body in death, but our eternal life energy unites with the force of a divine oversoul. Death is not darkness, but light.”
• Physical death is merely an event in the movement of a soul from one domain to another.
• “We choose our next world through what we learn in this one. Learn nothing, and the next world is the same as this one, all the same limitations and lead weights to overcome.” We must seek our own perfection—this is the reason for living. - Richard bach

Spirituality

• “Because you think you have body or mind, you have lonely feelings, but when you realize that everything is just a flashing into the vast universe, you become very strong, and your existence becomes very meaningful.”
• “Do not be subject to labels; do not be full of schemes; do not assume you are in charge of affairs; do not be subject to knowledge. Comprehend the infinite, and roam in the traceless.” 
• People who comprehend the Tao are free from worry about the cycle of birth and death, good fortune or bad. They can live without too much investment in seeking great things or avoiding bad things, their happiness coming from perfect calmness and detachment. They  see everything as part of the whole. They cannot be offended or have their reputation ruined, because their eyes are on larger things.
• Most people try to find fulfillment, but the wise person seeks to be empty, a channel for the Tao. A Tao-attuned person has a child’s delight in life combined with the wisdom of a sage.
• “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.”
• Meaningful coincidences are a sign of the spiritual evolution of the human race.
• Most people on the spiritual path start off by giving a certain amount of time or energy to spiritual matters, but then realize that all of life is a spiritual matter—there is nothing that is not.
• An evolved person always had a certain detachment, at ease with themselves no matter what the circumstances.
• “Be grateful as your deeds become less and less associated with your name, as your feet ever more lightly tread the earth.” -  G.I.Gurdjieff
• Instead of striving for great spiritual heights, gain peace and power from the acceptance of life as it is.
• Existence, though it may seem a bewildering and fearful tumult of separate people, places, events, and feelings, is like the river in that it is really all one current. And in its oneness it is perfect. - Siddartha
• The message of Siddartha is that we should not try to withdraw from life to have a superior feeling of holiness, but throw ourselves into things. Filled with events, thoughts, and relationships, life often seems terribly fragmented, but from the perspective of the bank it is one, smooth-flowing river of experience. If you can appreciate this unity, you become less wrapped up in yourself and identify with the larger flow of life.
• “People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child—our own two eyes. All is a miracle.” 
• Approach everything in life in a spirit of friendship.
• “In quietness are all things answered, and is every problem quietly resolved.”
• “All things work together for good. There are no exceptions except in the ego’s judgment.”
• Inner spiritual progress can motivate great earthly achievements.
• Equanimity is perhaps the greatest spiritual gift, not in a fatalistic sense, but in affirming the beauty of life in all its imperfections.
• “The fruit of silence is prayer; The fruit of prayer is faith; The fruit of faith is love; The fruit of love is service; The fruit of service is peace.” - Mother Teresa
• “When you choose the energy of your soul—when you choose to create with the intentions of love, forgiveness, humbleness and clarity— you gain power.”

Meditation

• In meditation we disconnect from our ego and our senses. If we do have thoughts during meditation, ultimately they will come only as intuition or guidance, not sabotaging thoughts.
• “If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities; in the expert’s mind there are few.”
• Ram Dass’s own conclusion was that drugs were only one door into higher knowledge, pointing out: “The goal of the path is to BE high, not GET high.”
• Intense spiritual experience can change the life of even the most unlikely person.
• A peaceful and intelligent mind can be attained through simply sitting and breathing.
• Meditation is the highest form of self-expression.
• Via meditation, prayer, or reflection we are better able to recognize these directions and live in accord with what our soul really wants. 
• The more time we spend in meditation, the more ordered our world becomes. If we have a calm mind, in touch with what is real and stable, our life has a way of sorting itself out. This is the intelligent, natural way of being.

God

• Set aside time in your life to honor God and all that has been created.
• If God had created everything, the only thing we could offer back was our suffering.
• “The closer you live to God, the smaller everything else appears.” Real spirituality means accepting everything, good and bad, darkness and light, as part of the whole.
• “All the troubles of the world, especially spiritual troubles such as impatience, hopelessness, and despair, derive from the failure to see the grandeur of God clearly.” -  Abraham Isaac Kook
• Self-fulfillment is only achieved through greater knowledge of God.
• From one bit of existence, the soul can perceive the existence of God, which has neither beginning nor end.”
• “If you think of yourself as something, then God cannot clothe himself in you, for God is infinite.”
• The paradox of the successful person is that although they have got where they have through self-control, genuine success will only emerge when they let go of self-regard and just became a tool of God.
• The relationship between God and us is not one of master and servant, but of equals engaged in creating the world.

-50 Spiritual Classics Timeless wisdom from 50 great books of
inner discovery, enlightenment, and purpose
http://203.128.31.71/articles/1857883497.pdf

Toltec's The Four Agreements

Meditation Enables us to

Science of Meditation

There are three great happenings in the science of meditation :

" The First Happening "

" When we are with the normal, natural, simple, easy, soft, tender, shallow, tranquil, peaceful flow of the breath  ... the mind becomes rather empty "

Meditation is silencing the incessant chatter of the restless mind. For that ... we ... begin ... with ... the ... breath

The mind has to be with the breath. That is the bottom-line. If the mind is not with the breath, it does, not become empty.

The mind has to become uncluttered and rather empty.

The mind has to lose all its unscientific socio-religious mental images and meaningless props. In the same token, chanting of any mantra doesn't play any role in meditation. The mouth has to be kept shut.

Since meditation is silencing the incessant chattering mind, we can't have any mental image whatsoever to concentrate upon. No mental images whatsoever. No visualization exercises. And, again, no mantras in the mouth.

We have to attune ourselves to our natural and normal breath. When we attune ourselves to the breath, the mind becomes by and by less tense ... and less dense ... and sooner than later, it becomes rather empty.

Breath is not a part of the body; but it is in the body ... and it is sufficiently material to focus upon.

Breath is the ambassador of pure consciousness in the body. Breath is an incessantly happening thing. Breath does not age. Breath is so simple. Breath can be experienced. Breath can be grasped. Breath can be very easily attuned to.

Being with the simple, natural flow of the breath is the ' alpha ' in the science of meditation.

" The Second Happening "

" When the mind is rather empty, huge amount of cosmic energy floods into the physical body .. into the physical-ness "

A ' jungle-like mind ' doesn't allow cosmic energy to enter into the body-system.

When the mind is like a forest, it becomes a great barrier ... it does not allow any cosmic energy to seep into the physical body.

The 'jungle-like mind ' is so very impermeable. So very ' solid ' However, when the ' solid-like mind ' becomes a ' liquid-like mind ' or a ' vapour-like mind ', there is so much more porosity and the mind becomes that much more permeable .. and ... the cosmic energy floods into the physical body ... following the simple laws of natural physics.

The mind is the separator of the physical energy and the cosmic energy. When the mind is like a forest, it acts like a solid barrier.

So, to make our ' solid - like mind ' into a ' vapour - like mind ' ... where there are very few thoughts, and more number of gaps ... that is meditation. And, the way is only through breath.

" The Third Happening "

" When sufficient amount of cosmic energy enters the physical body .. the result is a reasonable amount of activation of the third-eye "

The culminating result in meditation is the activation of our 'inner senses ' or the ' third-eye '. The end result of meditation is activation of our extra sensory perception. The final result of meditation is activation of our SOUL CONSCIOUSNESS. The final product of meditation is acquiring a SOLID SOUL.

In the case of a normal man, it is as if the soul is lost. The soul is the paradise. In the case of a normal person, the paradise has been lost. The paradise has to be regained ... that is done in meditation.

The physical body needs to become saturated with cosmic energy. When the body is saturated with cosmic energy, when the black patches in the etheric body are dissolved, the soul's potential becomes gradually kinetic. And, the soul has infinite potential, and Infinite capacity. However, all that is just dry and barren as long as we don't awaken it through our mediation.

The science of meditation is the science of energy maximization. The science of mediation is the true science of physical health. The science of meditation is the true science of joy. The science of meditation is the true unifying science. It unifies all the divided sects of humanity. Hail unto the science of meditation.

http://www.truthbliss.com/meditation_enlightment.html

What is Enlightenment?

• Enlightenment is endless traveling of and exploration into the nature of formation of events, scientific nature of personal reality, scientific nature of the psyche!
• Enlightenment is losing utterly our self-importance, reducing ourselves to zero!
• Enlightenment means to find out what we most want to do, and then going and doing it !
• Enlightenment means never to be in hurry, never to be in worry and never to waste a single moment !
• Enlightenment means to ever to live in the present, and never to think of the past or of the future!
• Enlightenment is, understanding that nothing is by chance but everything is by choice!
• Enlightenment is to understand that the only subject to understand, the only subject to be studied, is Spiritual Science!
• Enlightenment is to understand that you can never be 'totally' enlightened!
• Enlightenment is to understand that you are "All That Is".
• Enlightenment is friendship and friendship is an abstract feeling of tenderness towards all cosmic beings!
• Enlightenment is compassion; compassion is and physicalised friendship!
• Enlightenment is never to lament, never to regret. Every regret is a fresh blunder!
• Enlightenment is the ability to learn both from the superior and from the inferior; both from the wise and from the stupid!
• Enlightenment is to sit silently in front of a Master!
• Enlightenment is sometimes to doubt and sometimes to question, but never to mistrust the basic human goodness and integrity!
• Enlightenment is to be sincere and serious. Sincerity leads to seriousness; seriousness leads to enlightenment!
• Enlightenment is always to act impeccably in a given moment according to the given situation!
• Enlightenment is the art of ever maintaining inner silence in the midst of all the cacophony existing in the outer world!
• Enlightenment is to flow with our own nature and to let others flow freely in their respective own particular natures!
• Enlightenment is to understand that our potentialities are infinite!
• Enlightenment is to understand that we create our own reality. Our beliefs form our experiences!
• Enlightenment is to destroy the 'society' mentally, so that we live in the society but the 'society' does not live in us!
• Enlightenment is to be 'selfish' - to understand that we are born here primarily for our own growth and for our own development!
• Enlightenment is to be always in state of Recklessness... Fearlessness ... Dare-Devilness!
• Enlightenment is the ability to swing freely from one extreme to another extreme of emotions and moods, like a child!
• Enlightenment is never to form routines !
• Enlightenment is the ability to bear infinite pain and infinite insult !
• Enlightenment is the ability to freely mix with others without losing our own self-confidence or uniqueness!
• Enlightenment is never to suppress our emotions!
• Enlightenment is to understand that 'DEATH' is a STUPID IDEA! There is NO NEED TO DIE, if we do not want it!
• Enlightenment is to keep our neck ever erect in dignity and never to bow in guilt before others!
• Enlightenment is hearty, wholesome laughter- mostly at one's own self!
• Enlightenment is to understand that what we see at any given time is only a part of the truth, only one dimension of it!
• Enlightenment is to understand that we can never give enlightenment to others, and nobody can give enlightenment to us!
• Enlightenment is to understand that "there is good and there is bad" and also "there is no good and no bad"! Enlightenment means to realize the existence and validity of such paradoxical truths!
• Enlightenment is to understand that "Samsara is Nirvana".
• Enlightenment is to totally eschew "ONE GURU" concept!
• Enlightenment is to understand that 'Time' is the greatest illusion!
• Enlightenment is never to indulge in judging others. Judgment is rank unenlightenment!
• Enlightenment is to understand that basically there are no rules and regulations for conduct. All life is free exploration of its own likes and dislikes!
• Enlightenment is ever to involve ourselves in the immediate task of the immediate moment!
• Enlightenment is to understand always that the source of all wisdom is MEDITATION and nothing else!
• Enlightenment is equivalent to creativity. To be non-creative is to be non-enlightened!
• Enlightenment is ever to think before we speak and ever to think after we speak!
• Enlightenment is never to go by others instructions, other desires, others thoughts! Enlightenment is to always follow one's own inner conscience!
• Enlightenment is to understand that 'practice' is natural shadow of knowledge. As new knowledge is acquired, old practices get dropped automatically!
• Enlightenment is to know that "Matter is the crystallization of energy"; Energy is the creation of thought; Thought is the function of consciousness; and consciousness is the fundamentum.

http://www.truthbliss.com/images/Meditation.pdf

Bhagwan Dattatreya and his 24 Gurus

One day when Dattatreya was still a child the  king of a neighboring country came to visit the ashram, and because his parents were away, the boy greeted the guest in the palace. As Dattatreya made arrangements for the visitor’s comfort, the king saw an inner joy radiating from the boy’s countenance. And realizing that this was a spontaneous expression of the intrinsic beauty of the boy’s soul, he was sure that Dattatreya was gifted with great wisdom. Curious to learn how someone so young could be so wise, the king questioned the child, and the following dialogue ensued.

King: You have been studying with your parents?

Dattatreya: There is much to learn from everyone and everything, not only my parents.

King: Then you have a teacher? Who is it?

Dattatreya: I have 24 gurus (spiritual masters).

King: Twenty-four gurus at such a tender age? Who are they?

Dattatreya: Mother Earth is my first guru. She taught me to hold lovingly in my heart all those who trample me, scratch me and hurt me, just as she does. She taught me to give them my best, remembering that their acts are normal and natural from their standpoint.

King: Who is your second guru?

Dattatreya: Water. This force contains life and purity. It cleanses whatever it touches and provides life to whoever drinks it. Water flows unceasingly. If it stops, it becomes stagnant. “Keep moving, keep moving” is the lesson I learned from the water.

King: Your third guru?

Dattatreya: Fire. It burns everything, transforming it into flame. By consuming dead logs, it produces warmth and light. Thus, I learn to absorb everything that life brings and turn it into the flame that enlightens my life. In that light, others can walk safely.

King: Who is your fourth guru?

Dattatreya: The wind is my fourth guy. The wind moves unceasingly, touching flowers and thorns alike, but it never attaches itself to the objects it touches. Like the wind, I learned not to prefer flowers over throne, or friends over foes. Like the wind, my goal is to provide freshness to all without becoming attached.

King: The fifth guru, sir?

Dattatreya: All-pervading and all-embracing space is my fifth guru. Space has room for the sun, moon and stars, and yet it remains untouched and unconfined. I, too must have room for all the diversities of existence and still remain unaffected by what I contain. All visible and invisible objects have their rightful place within me, but they have no power to confine my consciousness.

King: Who is your sixth guru?

Dattatreya: The moon. The moon waxes and wanes, and yet it never loses its essence, totality or shape. From watching the moon I learned that waxing and waning, rising and falling, pleasure and pain, loss and gain are simply phases in life. While passing through these phases I never lose awareness of my true Self.

King: Who is your seventh guru?

Dattatreya: The sun is my seventh guru. With its bright rays, the sun draws water from everything, transforms it into clouds, and then distributes it with out favor as rain. Rain falls on forests, mountains, valleys, deserts, oceans and cities. Like the sun, I learned how to gather knowledge from all sources, transform that knowledge into practical wisdom, and share it with all without preferring some recipients and excluding others.

King: Your eighth guru?

Dattatreya: My eighth guru is a flock of pigeons. When one fell into a hunter’s net and cried in despair, the other pigeons tried to rescue it and got caught, too. From these pigeons I learned that even a positive reaction, if it springs from attachment and emotion, can entangle and ensnare. 

King: Your ninth guru?

Dattatreya: My ninth guru is the python who catches and eats its prey, and then doesn’t hunt again for a long time. It taught me that once my need has been met, I must be satisfied and not make myself miserable running after the objects of my desire.

King: Who is your tenth guru?

Dattatreya: The ocean, which is the abode of the waters. It receives and assimilates water from all the rivers in the world, yet it never overflows its boundaries. The ocean taught me that no matter what experiences I go through in life, no matter how many kicks and blows I receive, I must maintain my discipline. 

King: Who is your eleventh guru, O wise one?

Dattatreya: The moth is my eleventh guru. Drawn by light, it flies from  dwelling to dwelling to sacrifice itself in the flame. It taught me that once I see the dawn, I must overcome my fear, soar at full speed, and plunge into the flame of knowledge to be consumed and transformed. 

King: The twelfth guru?

Dattatreya: My twelfth guy is the bumblebee, who takes only the tiniest drops of nectar from the flowers. And before accepting even that much, it hums and hovers and dances, creating an atmosphere of joy around the blossom. It not only sings the song of cheerfulness, it also gives more to flowers than it takes; it pollinates the plants and helps them prosper by flying from one to another. I leaned from the bumblebee that I should take only a little from nature and that I should do so cheerfully, enriching the source from which I receive sustenance. 

King: Who is your thirteenth guru?

Dattatreya: My thirteenth guru is the honeybee, who collects more nectar than it needs. It gathers nectar from different sources, swallows it, transforms it into honey, and brings it to the hive. It consumes only a bit of what it gathers and shares the rest with others. Thus, I should gather wisdom from the teachers of all disciplines and process the knowledge that I gain. I must apply the knowledge that is conducive to my growth, but I must be ready to share everything I know with others.

King: Who is your fourteenth guru, I wise seeker?

Dattatreya: Once I saw a wild elephant being trapped. A tame female elephant in season was the bait. Sensing her presence, the wild male emerged from its domain and fell into a pit that had been cleverly concealed with branches and heaps of leaves. Once caught, the wild elephant was tamed to be used by others. This elephant is my fourteenth guru because he taught me to be careful with my passions and desires. Worldly charms arouse our sensory impulses, and while chasing after the sense cravings the mind gets trapped and enslaved, even though it is powerful.

King: Your fifteenth guru?

Dattatreya: The deer, with its keen sense of hearing. It listens intently and is wary of all noises–but it is lured to its doom by the melody of the deer hunter’s flute. Like the deer, we keep our ears alert for every bit of news, rumor and gossip, and are skeptical about much that we hear. What I learned from the deer is that we become spellbound by certain words which–due to our desires, attachments, cravings and vasanas [subtle impressions from the past]–we delight to hear. This tendency creates misery for ourselves and others.

King: Your sixteenth guru?

Dattatreya: The fish who swallows a baited hook is caught by the fisherman. This world is like bait. As long as I remember the fish, I remain free of the hook.

King: Who is your seventeenth guru?

Dattatreya: A prostitute. She knows that she doesn’t love her customers, nor do they love her. She waits for them, and when they come she enacts the drama of love, but she isn’t satisfied with artificial love she gives or receives, nor with the payment she is given. Through her I realized that all humans are like prostitutes and the world, like customers, is enjoying us. The payment is always inadequate and we feel dissatisfied. This I determined not to live like a prostitute. Instead, I will live with dignity and self-respect. I will not expect the world to give me either material or internal satisfaction. I will find satisfaction myself by going within

King: Who is your eighteenth guru?

Dattatreya: My eighteenth guru is the little bird who was flying with a worm in its beak. Larger birds flew after him began to peck him. They stopped only when the little bird dropped the worm. Thus I learned that the secret of survival lies in renunciation, not possession.

King: Who is your nineteenth guru?

Dattatreya: My nineteenth guru is the baby that cries when it is hungry and stops when it suckles at its mother’s breast. When the baby is full, it stops feeding and nothing its mother does can induce it to take more milk. I learned from this baby to demand only what I really need. When it is provided, I must take only what I require and then turn my face away.

King: Who is your twentieth guru?

Dattatreya: A young woman whom I met when I was begging for alms. She told me to wait while she prepared a meal. Her bracelets jangled as she cooked, so she removed one. But the noise continued, so she took them all off one by  one until only one remained. Then there was silence. Thus I learned that wherever there is a crowd, there is noise, disagreement and dissension. Peace can be expected only in solitude.

King: Who is your twenty-first guru?

Dattatreya: A snake who makes no hole for itself, but rests in holes other creatures have abandoned, or curls up in the hollow of a tree for a while, and then moves on. From this snake I learned to adjust myself to my environment and enjoy the resources of nature without encumbering myself with a permanent home. Creatures in nature move constantly, continually abandoning their previous dwellings. Therefore, while floating along the current of nature, I find plenty of place to rest. Once I am rest, I move on. 

King: Your twenty-second guru?

Dattatreya: My twenty-second guru is the arrow-maker who was so absorbed in shaping his arrowheads that the king and his entire army passed nearby without attracting his attention. Thus I learned to be absorbed in the fast at hand, no matter how big or small. The more one-pointed my focus, the greater my absorption, the more subtle my awareness. The goal is subtle; it can be grasped only by subtle awareness.

King: Your twenty-third guru?

Dattatreya: My twenty-third guru is the little spider who built itself a nice cozy web. When a larger spider chased it, it rushed to take refuge in its web. But it ran so fast that it got entangled and was swallowed by the bigger spider. Thus I learned that we create webs for ourselves by trying to build a safe haven, and as we race along the threads of these webs, we become entangled and are consumed. There is no safety to be found in the complicated webs of our actions. 

King: And who is your twenty-fourth guru?

Dattatreya: My twenty-fourth guru is the worm who was caught by the songbird and placed in its nest. As the bird began to sing, the worm became to absorbed in the song that it lost all awareness of its peril. Watching this little creature become absorbed in a song in the face of death reminded me that I, too, must develop the art of listening so that I may become absorbed in the eternal sound, nada, that is always within me. 

Listening to Dattatreya, the king realized that the wisdom of this young sage flowed from his determination to keep the goal of life firmly fixed in his awareness as well as from his ability to discover the lessons of life everywhere he turned. 

Dattatreya’s teachings are preserved in the vast literature of the Puranas and in the Datta Samhita, Avadhuta Gita, Dattatreya Upanishad, and Advadhuta Upanishad. This story is from the Srimad Bhagavatam. Many of these works are available in English.

http://silenceofsoul.com/articles/Bhagwan-Dattatreya-and-his-24-Gurus-a160.html

Magic Money

Sit down and take a few minutes to think back through your childhood before you had any or much money. As you recall each memory where money was paid for you, say and feel the magic words, thank you, with all your heart for each instance.

• Did you always have food to eat?
• Did you live in a home?
• Did you receive an education over many years?
• How did you travel to school each day? 
• Did you have schoolbooks, school lunches, and all the things you needed for school?
• Did you go on any vacations when you were a child?
• What were the most exciting birthday gifts you received when you were a child?
• Did you have a bike, toys, or a pet?
• Did you have clothes as you grew so quickly from one size to the next?
• Did you go to the movies, play sports, learn a musical instrument, or pursue a hobby?
• Did you go to the doctor and take medicine when you were not well?
• Did you go to the dentist?
• Did you have essential items that you used every day, like your toothbrush, toothpaste, soap, and shampoo?
• Did you travel in a car?
• Did you watch television, make phone calls, use lights, electricity, and water?

All of these things cost money, and you received them all – at no charge! As you travel back through memories of your childhood and youth, you’ll realize how many things you received that equate to hard-earned money. Be grateful for every single instance and memory, because when you can feel sincere gratitude for the money you’ve received in the past, your money will magically increase in the future! It is guaranteed by Universal law.

To continue with the practice of Magic Money, take a dollar bill and write on a sticker that you place on the bill:

THANK YOU FOR ALL THE MONEY I’VE BEEN GIVEN THROUGHOUT MY LIFE.

Take your Magic Dollar Bill with you today and put it in your wallet, purse, or pocket. At least once in the morning and once in the afternoon, or as many times as you want, take it out and hold the Magic Dollar Bill in your hands. Read your written words and be truly grateful for the abundance of money you’ve been given in your life. The more sincere you are, and the more you feel it, the faster you will see a miraculous change to the circumstances of your money.

“Whoever has gratitude (for money) will be given more, and she or he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have gratitude (for money), even what she or he has will be taken from her or him."


An abundance of gratitude for money equals an abundance of money!

-The Magic, Rhonda Bryne

http://themagicofthesecret.blogspot.in/2012/04/day-5-magic-money.html

Become a Buddha

A person who grows on the spiritual path cannot ignore Gautama because his presence has become so dominant. In his own lifetime, he had forty thousand monks who went out to spread the spiritual process. In his own silent way, he changed the world forever. He has been one of the greatest spiritual waves on the planet. Buddha Pournami has always been significant in the yogic culture and was always a very auspicious day in any spiritual aspirant’s life, but today, in commemoration of Gautama Buddha we named it after him. On that full moon evening over 2500 years ago, a man blossomed into a being.

Though people generally associate the word Buddha with Gautama, he is not the only Buddha. There have been thousands of Buddhas on this planet and there still are. “Bu” means Buddhi or the intellect; “Dha” means Dhadha or one who is above. One who is above his intellect, one who is no longer a part of his mind, is a Buddha.

Right now, most people are just a bundle of thoughts, emotions, opinions, and of course, prejudices. Please see, what you consider as “myself” is just a jumble of things that you have gathered from outside. Whichever kind of situations you were exposed to, that is the kind of nonsense you have gathered in your mind. Your mind is society’s garbage bin because you have no choice about what to take and what not to take. Whoever goes that way throws something into your head. You can enshrine this nonsense as divinity if you want but it will not become divinity; it is just simple mind. There is another way to experience life and go beyond the process that you call as mind. To do this, you need to shut the garbage bin and keep it aside.

The mind is a phenomenal thing, but if you get stuck to it, it will take you for a ride endlessly.

The mind is a phenomenal thing, but if you get stuck to it, it will take you for a ride endlessly. If you are in the mind, you are a nonstop suffering human being – you cannot help it. Suffering is inevitable. Maybe when you are watching the sunset, it is so beautiful that you forget everything, but your suffering is sitting right behind you like a tail. The moment you look back, it is right there. What you call as “my happiness,” are those moments when you forgot your suffering. As long as you are in the mind, fears, anxieties and struggles are inevitable; that is the nature of the mind.

It is because people are unable to bear the torture of the mind that they have devised many ways in society to go below the mind. Excessive eating, alcohol, excessive indulgence in physical pleasures, these are all ways to go below the mind. People use them and for a few moments they forget the torture. You hit the bottle and sleep. For a few hours your mind does not bother you anymore because you have gone below the mind. There is great pleasure and it is so relaxing because suddenly the tortures of your mind are not there. So you get deeply addicted to it.

But the nature of the evolutionary process is such that this being which was below the mind has right now evolved into the mind. If it wants to become free, it has to go beyond the mind. There is no such thing as going back. If by using a chemical you go below the mind, you will see, life always catches up with you with more intensity after that is over. It is always so. Suffering intensifies. The process of yoga is to see how to go beyond the mind. Only when you are beyond the mind can you really be yourself.

http://blog.ishafoundation.org/sadhguru/masters-words/become-a-buddha/

Spiritual Reality Power of Meditation

Laughing Meditation

http://www.youtube.com/TheChopraWell

Questions on Self-Awareness

Michael Shermer and Deepak Chopra | WHO ARE YOU? Part 1

Deepak Chopra Plays Basketball With His Son

Michael Shermer Word Play WHO ARE YOU? Part 2

Michael Shermer fires back at Deepak Chopra | WHO ARE YOU? Part 3


http://www.youtube.com/TheChopraWell

How To Embrace Your Inner Child

https://www.facebook.com/notes/vallapureddy-hari-kumar/how-to-embrace-your-inner-child-dr-hari-kumar/10200575579138983

The Eightfold Path

The Astral Body And Other Astral Phenomena

Size of Astral Body

• In an average moral and intellectual man the astral body is considerably larger, extending about 18 inches on each side of the body.

Astral Aura

• That portion of the astral body which extends beyond the limits of the physical body is usually termed the astral "aura."
• Intense feeling means a large aura. The aura of the Buddha is said to have been three miles in radius.

Functions of astral body

• To make sensation possible.
• To serve as a bridge between mind and physical matter.
• To act as an independent vehicle of consciousness and action.

Astral body can be used as an independent vehicle of consciousness.

1. During ordinary waking consciousness
2. During sleep
3. To develop the powers of the astral body that a man may consciously and deliberately, at any time that he chooses, leave the physical body and pass with unbroken consciousness into the astral body.
4. After physical death the consciousness withdraws itself into the astral body.

Invisible Helpers

• An immense amount of work is also done for the living by putting good thoughts into the minds of those, who are ready to receive them.
• Qualifications needed by one who aspires to be a helper:

1. Single-mindedness,
2. Self-Control.
3. Calmness.
4. Knowledge.
5. Love.

Thought-Forms

• A pure heart and mind are the best protection against inimical assaults of feeling and thought.
• Meditation upon a Master makes a link with Him, which shows itself to clairvoyant vision as a kind of line of light. The Master always subconsciously feels the impinging of such a line, and sends out along it in response a steady stream of magnetism which continues to play long after the meditation is over. Regularity in such meditation is a very important factor
• An Indian teacher not only may prescribe for his pupil special kinds of exercises or study, in order to purify, strengthen and develop the astral body, but also by keeping the pupil in his neighbourhood physically seeks by this close association to harmonise and attune the pupil's vehicles to his own.
• The power of the united thought of a number of people is always far more than the sum of their separate thoughts: it would be more nearly represented by their product.
• Accuracy in thought is essential, but it should be attained not by hurry or fuss but by perfect calmness.

Physical Life

• Foods which tend to growth, such as grain and fruits, are sâtvic, or rhythmic, being the most highly vitalised and suitable for building up a body sensitive and at the same time strong.
• Ocean, mountain, forest, waterfall, each has its own special type of life, astral and etheric as well as visible, and therefore its own set of influences. Many of these unseen entities are pouring out vitality, and in any case their effect on etheric, astral and mental bodies is likely to be healthy and desirable in the long run, though a change may be somewhat tiring at the time. Hence an occasional change from town to country is beneficial on the ground of emotional as well as physical health.
• Gums chosen for incense give out radiations favourable to spiritual and devotional thought, and do not harmonise with any form of disturbance or worry. 
• The astral body slowly but constantly wears away, precisely as does the physical, the particles which fall away are replaced by others from the surrounding atmosphere.

Emotional Life

• As finer matter is more easily moved than coarse, it follows that a given amount of force spent in good thought or feeling produces perhaps a hundred times as much result as the same amount of force sent out into coarser matter.
• The effect of 10% of force directed to good ends enormously outweighs that of 90% devoted to selfish purposes, and so on the whole such a man makes an appreciable advance from life to life.
• The consciousness of man can be focused in only one vehicle at a time, though he may be simultaneously conscious through the others in a vague way.

Sleep Life

• Every one should determine each night to do something useful on the astral plane: 

1. to comfort some one in trouble: 
2. to use the will to pour strength into a friend who is weak or ill:
3. to calm some one who is excited or hysterical: 
4. or to perform some similar service.

• Occasionally, but rarely, the astral body is able to make a lasting impression on the brain, so that the medium is able to recollect the knowledge acquired during trance.
• One day, the man will find himself slipping out of the physical body while he is wide awake, and without any break in consciousness he discovers himself to be free.
• A man who has thus acquired complete mastery over the astral body may, of course, leave the physical body, not only during sleep, but at any time he chooses, and go to a distant place, etc

After-Death Life 

• His desires and emotions still persist, and consequently, owing to the readiness with which astral matter obeys his desires and thoughts, the forms surrounding him will be very largely the expression of his own feelings, the nature of which mainly determines whether his life is one of happiness or of discomfort.

The Fourth Dimension

• It seems certain that the astral world is four-dimensional, the mental five-dimensional, and the buddhic six dimensional.
• Astral phenomena as they appear to us living in the physical or three-dimensional world. Thus: 

1. Objects, by being lifted through the third dimension, could be made to appear in or disappear from the two-dimensional world at will.
2. An object completely surrounded by a line could be lifted out of the enclosed space through the third dimension.
3. By bending a two-dimensional world, represented by a sheet of paper, two distant points could be brought together, or even made to coincide, thus destroying the two-dimensional conception of distance.
4. A right-handed object could be turned over through the third dimension and made to re-appear as a left-handed object. 
5. By looking down, from the third dimension, on to a two-dimensional object, every point of the latter could be seen at once, and free from the distortion of perspective.

• Time is not in reality the fourth dimension at all
• Levitation, a method of neutralising or even reversing the force of gravity, was used in raising some of the air-ships of ancient India and Atlantis, and it is not improbable that a similar method was employed in constructing the Pyramids and Stonehenge.

Spiritualism

• No teaching from a self-appointed preceptor on the astral plane should be blindly accepted: all communications and advice which comes thence should be received precisely as one would receive similar advice on the physical plane. Teaching should be taken for what it is worth, after examination by conscience and intellect.
• What the average person can do on the astral plane after death he can do in physical life: communications may be as readily obtained by writing, in trance, or by utilising the developed and trained powers of the astral body, from embodied as from disembodied persons. In this manner knowledge may be safely accumulated and evolution accelerated.

Astral Death

• The exit from the astral body and the astral plane is thus a second death, the man leaving behind him an astral corpse which, in its turn, disintegrates, its materials being restored to the astral world, just as the materials of the physical body are returned to the physical world.

Re-Birth

• Each incarnation is inevitably, automatically, and justly linked with the preceding lives, so that the whole series forms a continuous, unbroken chain.
• It is only the clairvoyant who knows how enormously and how rapidly child characters would improve if only adult characters were better.

Mastery of Emotions

• All manifested existence may be analysed into the Self, the Not-Self, and the Relationship between these two.
• That Relationship may be divided into 

1. Cognition (Gnyânam): 
2. Desire (Ichchâ):  
3. Action (Kriyâ). To know, to desire, and to endeavour or act — those three comprise the whole of conscious life.

• High, pure and unselfish affection can never be transcended, since it is a characteristic of the Logos Himself, and is a necessary qualification for progress upon the Path which leads to the Masters and to Initiation. 

Development of Astral Powers

• Both the physical and the astral body must first be purified, by breaking the bonds of evil habits in eating, drinking, giving way to hate emotions of all kinds, etc.
• The attainment of astral powers as an end in itself inevitably leads to what is called in the East the laukika method of development: the powers obtained are only for the present personality and, there being no safeguards, the student is extremely likely to misuse them. 
• To this class belong the practices of Hatha Yoga, prânayama or breath-control, invocation of elementals, and all systems which involve deadening the physical senses in some way, actively by drugs (e.g., bhang, haschish, etc.), by self-hypnotisation, or, as among the dervishes, by whirling in a mad dance of religious fervour until vertigo and insensibility supervene: or passively by being mesmerised — so that the astral senses may come to the surface. 
• Other methods are crystal-gazing (which leads to nothing but the lowest type of clairvoyance), the repetition of invocations, or the use of charms or ceremonies.
• Medium, abdicates control over his own bodies in favour of another entity. Mediumship is thus not a power but a condition.
• Some people only once in their whole lives become sensitive enough to experience the presence of an astral entity or some astral phenomenon. Others find themselves with increasing frequency seeing and hearing things to which others are blind and deaf : others again begin to recollect their sleep-experiences.
• By means of meditation extreme sensitiveness can be developed, and at the same time perfect balance, sanity and health.

Clairvoyance in Space and Time

• Clairvoyance enables the seer to perceive events that have happened in the past. 
• There are many degrees of this power, from the trained man who can consult the Akâshic Records for himself at will, down to the person who gets occasional glimpses only.

Discipleship

• This pupil is taken into his Master's consciousness to so great an extent that whatever the pupil feels or thinks is within the astral and mental bodies of his Master.
• When the pupil sends a thought of devotion to his Master, it is as though a valve were opened: there is a tremendous downflow of love and power from the Master, the Master's power flowing ever outwards and in all directions like the sunlight.

- The Astral Body And Other Astral Phenomena

http://galactic.no/rune/spesBoker/13832420-Arthur-E-Powell-The-Astral-Body-1927.pdf

The Etheric Double: The Health Aura of Man

Pranamayakosha, or vehicle of Prana

Size of Etheric Double
Projects about one quarter of an inch beyond the skin.

Presence of Etheric Double

• Persons who have lost a limb by amputation sometimes complain that they can feel pain at the extremities of the amputated limb, i.e., at the place where the limb used to be.
• This is due to the fact that the etheric portion of the limb is not removed with the dense physical portion, but can still be seen in its place by clairvoyant sight

Indriyas

• Jnanendriyas, “knowledge-senses” or sense-centres: eyes, ears, tongue, nose and skin
• Karmendriyas, “action senses,” or sense-centres: hands, feet, larynx, organs of generation and excretion.

Vitality Globule

• Etheric body being constantly changed and replaced by fresh etheric particles, these being taken into the body along with the food eaten, with the air breathed, and with prana, in the form known as the Vitality Globule

Chakrams:

• The Chakrams are situated on the surface of the Double, that is about a quarter of an inch outside the skin of the body.
• In developed people, on the other hand, the chakrams glow and pulsate, blazing with blinding brilliance like miniature suns. They vary in size from about two inches in diameter to about six inches.

Functions of Chakrams

1. Base of Spine
Astral Center: Seat of Kundalini. Kundalini goes to each Centre inturn and vivifies it.
Etheric Center: Seat of Kundalini. Kundalini goes to each Centre in turn and vividies it.

2. Navel
Astral Center: Feeling: general sensitiveness.
Etheric Center: Feeling astral influences.

3. Spleen
Astral Center: Vitalises Astral Body. Power to Travel consciously.
Etheric Center: Vitalises Physical Body. Memory of astral journeys.

4. Heart
Astral Center: Comprehension of Astral Vibrations and sympathise with, and so instinctively understand, the feelings of other astral entities.
Etheric Center: Consciousness of feelings of others

5. Throat
Astral Center: Hearing 
Etheric Center: Etheric and Astral hearing.

6. Between eyebrows
Astral Center: Sight 
Etheric Center: Clairvoyance. Magnification.

7. Top of head
Astral Center: Perfects and completes faculties 
Etheric Center: Continuity of consciousness - enables a man through it to leave the physical body in full  consciousness, and also to re-enter it without the usual break

Kundalini

• The principal function of Kundalini in occult development is to pass through the etheric force centres and vivify these so that they bring through into the physical consciousness astral experiences. 
• Thus The Voice of The Silence teaches that a vivification in this manner of the eyebrows centre enables one to hear the voice of the Master, that is, of the Ego or Higher Self. 

Health

• Merely to increase the circulation of Prana is sufficient to cure many minor diseases.
• Headaches are usually caused by congestion, either of blood or of the vital fluid, sometimes called magnetism. A strong current directed by the healer through the head of the sufferer will wash away the congested matter and the headache will disappear.
• One who sets himself deliberately to purify his dense body, at the same time automatically refines its etheric counterpart.

Anasthesia

• The Double being the connecting link between the brain and the higher consciousness, the forcible extrusion of it from the dense physical body by anasthetics necessarily produces anasthesia.

Death

• It is during the withdrawal of the double, as well as afterwards, that the whole of the man’s past life passes swiftly in review before the Ego, every forgotten nook and corner of the memory yielding up its secrets, picture by picture, event by event. In these few seconds the Ego lives over again his whole life, seeing his successes and failures, loves and hatreds.
• As the days pass, the higher principles gradually disengage themselves from the double, and the latter then becomes in its turn an etheric corpse, which remains near the dense one, both disintegrating together.

Nature Sprits

• The nature-spirits are intensely shy and distrustful of men: they object to the physical manations of the average man – of meat, tobacco, and alcohol; also to low selfish feelings, such as lust, anger, or depression. 
• Strong, unselfish feelings of a lofty nature create the kind of atmosphere in which nature-spirits delight to bathe.

Baptism

• At baptism, in the Liberal Catholic Church, the priest makes the sign of the cross over the forehead, throat, heart and solar plexus of the child. This has the effect of opening up these etheric chakrams, so that they grow to, perhaps, the size of a crown piece, and begin to sparkle and whirl as they do in grown-up people.

- The Etheric Double: The Health Aura of Man, A.E.Powell

http://api.ning.com/files/JBeRfPa*Y6CqIv7o0lNixPFITKc-uV4gX0k2UWM74FxTr8hOQSZCslIQ2f7JqBpe3eMhkIT4NOgNbQahn9dAi*RejdM7-KHt/TheEthericDoubleA.E.Powell.pdf